

100 



the village of Upminster. Very little of the building of Ogle- 

 thorpe's time remains, but there are still in existence the old 

 garden walls, with their ancient, wrought-iron entrance gates. 

 There are also a few fine trees of considerable age, especially 

 a specimen of Fraxinus angustifolia and one of F. excelsior 

 heterophylla. The most conspicuous features of the garden, 

 however, are some very old yew hedges, very bulky and shapeless, 

 but still healthy and regularly clipped. They are thought to 

 be between three hundred and four hundred years old ; certainly 

 they were there in Oglethorpe's time. 



From its associations with the founder of their State, Cranham 

 Hall is naturally a place of great interest to the people of 

 Georgia, and it is visited every year by a number of pilgrims. 

 In 1916 a request was conveyed to Kew through Mr. H. A. 

 Alexander, from the members of a patriotic and historical 

 society in Atlanta, the capital of Georgia, that cuttings from 

 the old yew hedges should be taken with the view of their being 

 ultimately transplanted to some appropriate place in that city. 

 Kew was very willing to assist in gratifying so pleasing a 



sentiment, and an 



Hall to obta 



the cuttings. They were successfully rooted and, 'after con- 

 siderable delay owing to circumstances arising from the war, 

 500 healthy young plants were despatched to Atlanta on 

 February 25th. 



w. J. B. 



Echium Decaisnei and E, giganteum. — Dr. G. V. Perez, 



Santa Ursula, Tenerife, sends us the following notes on these two 

 species: — "I have in my garden a solitary plant of Echium 

 Decaisnei from Grand Canary, which is remarkable for its 

 resistance to drought and the very long time it remains in flower. 

 At a distance it is not at all unlike Echium giganteum, a native 

 of Tenerife, but its leaves are much more prickly, and its flowers 

 of course are quite different and tinged with a pretty blue. 



18 The curious thing about this plant is that I have not as yet 

 succeeded in reproducing it true from seed; so far as I know, 

 all the seed I have sown and the numerous seedlings I have 

 collected at its base have turned out to be hybrids. In this 

 respect this solitary Echium reminds me forcibly of my experi- 

 ence with single plants of our various species of Statice, which 

 practically never come true, but always as hybrids. I have just 

 now three young plants raised from Echium Decaisnei, and 

 extremely like it, but on close inspection I have little doubt that 

 they are hybrids of this species and E. giganteum-. These 

 hybrids show the great similarity there is between these two 

 species, and they might well be taken on superficial examination 

 for either of them. As both of them flower immediately nfter 

 the first rains, they and their hybrids would be very suitable 

 for certain parts of India, Egypt, Syria, etc. Many of our 

 species of Echium are late flowerers, but these are usually out 

 at Christmas. Another very early and pretty flowered Echium 

 is E. nervosum, from Madeira; it is very beautiful just now 

 (January 21st), and ought to be hybridised with the former two/* 



